Picasa and Photo Gallery's tags work both in the installed software and in the online galleries. The technology is included in Apple, iPhoto, Picasa, and Windows Photo Gallery, each implementing it a little differently. Names and Faces One of the coolest organizational tools to hit these programs is face recognition. iPhoto's Events does the same, even separating photo sessions by time and letting you merge and divide the Events to taste. Windows Photo Gallery lets you view just the photos taken on a specific date. But with the free programs, you can group pictures based on folders created for each import session and virtual albums of pictures selected from these, and you can organize them by date or tags. Organizing your photos is another forte of these free applications, though of couse, you can't expect the high-powered, slick organization tools of an Adobe Lightroom. One of the programs, Picasa 3.9, makes working with scanners, webcams, and screen captures simpler, too.
When you connect the USB cable or insert the card into a media slot, these programs will start up, let you batch-name and upload all the new images-and even digital movies, since pretty much every point-and-shooter now includes video-recording capability. It's gotten easier than ever to transfer pictures from your digital camera's media card.
